


Arcana

by selenite12



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Arranged Marriage, Bridgerton, Death Eaters, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Harry Potter Post War - Freeform, Magic, Post-War, Slow Burn, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-11 23:35:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29875731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/selenite12/pseuds/selenite12
Summary: All Aurora Rose wants is to be rid of her perfect, pure blood life. After being the first in her family to be sorted into any other house than Slytherin, she makes friends with the golden trio at Hogwarts. At the end of her fourth year, after Voldemort returns and she refuses to side with the death eaters, her parents send her away to Beauxbatons. After years of isolation in France, her parents return her home to England to rejoin their society. The only way she can escape them, is to join them, but there is one person who is determined to go through any means to stop her from getting what she wants, and his name is Draco Malfoy.





	Arcana

Chapter 1: The High Priestess

The beginning of Aurora’s life went as it should and the outcome was arguably the same as it was meant to be. The inbetween of it all is where it went wayward and this is that story.  
Aurora Rose was born to two pureblood parents, Callista and Collin Rose- apparently they gave up on the whole ‘C’ name thing- forgive me, I’m already digressing. As one of the sacred twenty eight families, her parents raised her how any aristocrat would; emotionally distant, strict, and with the highest expectations. 

Aurora remembered one of the first times she disappointed her parents, they found her at seven years old covered in mud and she had magically turned her mother’s white roses red. This was not how a pureblood young lady should act, it was unheard of, unspeakable even! The older she got, Aurora realized she wasn’t quite cut out for the life that had been chosen for her. 

The real problems began when she started school at Hogwarts. She had been sorted into Gryffindor, her parents, their parents and their parent’s parents had always been sorted into Slytherin; In fact she was the first in their entire family to ever be sorted into Gryffindor. Of course, it wasn’t necessarily the house that caused problems, it was what came from that. It all could be derived back to three words. The golden trio. 

She befriended Harry, Ron, and Hermione which seemed to always lead to her getting in trouble. On top of the fact that as a family of death eaters, being friends with the chosen one was practically treason. Aurora refused all reasoning from her parents, she started developing her own opinions on blood purity and the dark lord, leaving her family wondering where they went wrong. It all came to a head at the end of the fourth year, when the dark lord returned. They no longer had time to convince her she had gone down the wrong path and certainly couldn’t protect her from what was to come, so they sent her away. 

Aurora was sent to Beauxbatons school for witches in France, far away from trouble. She was barely allowed home, often spending holidays abroad, while her parents plotted to kill her best friends in the name of a serpentine supremacist. It was all pretty backwards, if you asked her.  
After the war was won, many of the sacred twenty eight somehow evaded Azkaban, including her parents. So she had returned to a place that felt nothing like home, to return living as if none of this ever happened. That was precisely the problem, it did happen, in fact a lot of things had happened while she was hidden away at a foreign school. Yet, she was forced back into a life she never wanted, required to do the most trivial tasks for a recently graduated witch; It was marriage season amongst the elitist wizards. They would never outright say they were arranged marriages, no, matters amongst these people were always handled with the utmost delicacy. However, one within the society always knew when a suggestion was an order, which they often were. 

Aurora was set on doing anything in her power to avoid this. 

Aurora recalled her first few days back in the Rose Manor hiding away in her room feigning a spontaneous illness. They allowed her those few days in which she spent married to a bottle of wine and plotted her escape from the grounds. It was a horrible habit she developed in her later years of school- the drinking that is. Her parent’s patience ran thin quite quickly. If anyone could see through her it was her parents and despite the war being over, they had zero tolerance for anything less than perfect behavior. That is what’s wrong with aristocrats, regardless of country or culture, there was always a reputation to uphold.  
On the fourth day, she was requested to join her parents for a walk in the garden, it was another one of those commands disguised in pleasantries- you’ll find those a common theme in Aurora’s story. 

She pulled on an ankle length floral dress over her tall, slender body and her feet remained bare. She liked to feel the earth under her soles as she walked. Of course, it was the first thing her mother noticed when she met them down stairs, Callista released an irritated breath but decided to let it slide for now. 

“Are you feeling alright now?” Her father barely looked at her, only asking to be polite. He knew very well that she had been faking the fever. 

“Healthy as ever.” Aurora responded curtly, daring a slight sarcasm in her tone. It never was easy for her to hide her disdain, nor keep her temper in check. It was a quality her parents disliked most about her daughter, they found it unlady like and rather low class. 

They all began to walk, the midmorning sun kissed her bare shoulders and the warm earth eased her temperament. It was exactly as she remembered, white roses, statues of ancestors, and shrubbery shaped into the most grand and whimsical figures. Aurora thought she would love this garden if it didn’t sit on her least favorite property in all of england.  
Her mother waved her wand to fix an out of place stone that no one would have noticed, but that was Aurora’s mother for you. She couldn’t do with a single thing out of place. 

“I assume you remember Pansy Parkinson?” Callista spoke as she paced next to her daughter.  
Pansy Parkinson had been her childhood friend, she grew up with most of the children of the sacred twenty eight. They hadn’t really spoken since they were eleven, nor did they see each other at all after she left Hogwarts at fourteen. 

“I do.” Aurora responded bluntly. “Her and that whole lot of Slytherin’s, what of it?” 

Collin wrinkled his nose visibly at the horrid informality of his daughter's words, but said nothing. She found it quite off that they were being more lenient with her than usual. If it had been years ago they would have lectured her on how to speak with grace. They must have wanted something. 

“I thought it would be nice for you to see her again and then the rest of them all. It would be nice to rekindle your old friendships with some good people.” Her mother looked at her now, speaking as if she truly did want the best for her. Aurora found it kind of sad, how twisted it was that her parents genuinely thought they were helping her. They couldn’t see how wrong they were, how wrong all of this was. 

In truth, she didn’t hate any of those kids, she more so pitied them. They either were still so indoctrinated by their criminal parents or they never were able to find their way out. That being said, she wasn’t keen on buddying up to them either. She couldn’t forget they weren’t the bunch easy to forgive or to mess with. Aurora had a feeling they weren’t too excited to see her either after all these years, all the rumors of her being a blood traitor.  
If there was one thing that Aurora learned growing up in this environment, it was how to make her parents docile. Like in any war, sometimes it was necessary to lose some battles to take victory in the end. It was always living to see another day with them, with the hopes that finally escape this all.  
Now you may be wondering, why can’t she just leave? It was a simple answer. She had nowhere to go and no money to her own name, despite the huge fortune she would inherit when her parents deemed her ‘ready’. Besides, Aurora’s parents would find her before she could disappear. They only had one heir, and they were keen on keeping her. 

“I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing her.” Aurora answered her waiting mother after much thought. She was many things, but absolutely not naive. She knew she wouldn’t be welcomed back into the exclusive group of Slytherins. Nonetheless, her mother’s face shone with something close to satisfaction.  
Aurora turned her cheek away to roll her eyes and slyly knocked a stone out of place into the walkway as they passed. It was her own little act of defiance since she needed to let her parents think they had won this small battle with her. The petty part of Aurora needed to act out against them so she could still feel in control of her independence. More so as a reminder that she would never be the brainlessly loyal daughter they so wished her to be. 

She was to leave for Parkinson Manor at seven o’clock, Aurora’s first furlough since she had been home. She prepared for this outing by sipping down an entire bottle of wine as she got ready. She thought one bottle wasn’t nearly enough to dull her brain enough to spend an evening with Pansy Parkinson, but she was working with rations at this point. Her parents were nothing if not hyper observant, so she had to be careful to keep her new ‘habit’ a secret.  
~~  
Aurora arrived by floo network to Parkinson Manor. She briefly remembered coming here as a child, it was as it always had been, richly decorated and hauntingly empty. Aurora was met by Pansy’s parents. 

“So glad to have you back with us.” Pansy’s mother’s smile was falsely warm and her father stood sternly by her side. Their composure was similar to how one would act as they performed a favor they would rather not do. 

“So glad to be back.” Aurora said, almost exaggerating her feigned friendliness.  
Pansy’s father narrowed his eyes slightly at her, her attitude was clearly burning through their hospitality quickly. They had little fondness for improper behavior, especially from a suspected traitor. 

“Pansy’s in the drawing room, we’ll show you the way.” His lips peeled away from his teeth into what Aurora thought was a smile, but she wasn’t sure. She followed him anyway, as they glided down the hall to a large set of french doors. Pansy stood from the armchair she had sat in when she saw Aurora, with arms crossed over her chest.

“Right, well you two have fun catching up.” Pansy’s mother said with a humored undertone, if they thought they were all sharing a private joke, Aurora understood it quite well: She was the joke.  
Aurora sat down on the expensive upholstered couch as if it were made of only pins and needles. Pansy looked over her posture and expression in a scrutinizing way as if she were deciding if she were a threat. She must have decided against it because after a moment she asked,

“Tea?”

“I’m alright.” Aurora responded, she didn’t want to make it seem as though she was getting comfortable here, plus she wasn’t entirely sure Pansy was above poisoning her tea. Slytherins could be quite brutal if they had it out with you. Aurora wasn’t exactly sure where she stood with Pansy, much less any of her other ‘old friends’. She wanted to laugh at how she was worried over whether these war criminals liked her or not. She refused to believe any part of her cared about them anymore, however they were a means to an end.

“Not even with something a little stronger?” Pansy waved her wand causing an aged bottle of firewhiskey to float itself over to the table between them where a tea set sat.  
Aurora let a small smile grace her lips, “Perfect.” Perhaps Pansy wasn’t entirely rotten, at least they had one thing in common.  
Pansy brushed a black lock away from her contrastingly porcelain skin as her magic did the work pouring the drinks. She was captivating to look at, strong bone structure and piercing blue eyes, yet it was a hauntingly type of beautiful. She thought it matched the aesthetic of her home well. 

“This is funny don’t you think?” Pansy asked her. 

“Me being back here, back to all of this?” Aurora said taking a hearty swallow of the strongly spiked drink. She didn’t falter at the taste, which Pansy seemed to take note of. She almost forgot how calculating her old friend was, always taking in information, storing it for later. What seemed unimportant to most was paramount for Pansy. “I wouldn’t say funny so much as, hm, full circle? Ironic?” 

Pansy sneered at her. “Well I think it’s hilarious. All the drama it’s going to stir up around here. The prodigal daughter returns!” She uttered the last sentence with a sort of sarcastic, theatrical tone. 

Aurora didn’t respond to this. Her comment made her remember exactly what was to unfold. She was to return to the ‘community gatherings’ and balls and events, everything she hated with everyone she hated. A means to an end, she quickly reminded herself.  
Pansy spoke again to fill the silence, “What was it like at that school?” She asked clearly to be polite, but couldn’t hide her boredom of the question. 

“Look, I think we owe each other to skip the small talk. I was sent away to boarding school on bad behavior and all of you were turned into evil cadets in a war and you lost and now we're both here.” Aurora snapped all of a sudden, with a possibility the alcohol was spreading through her bloodstream giving her more courage than she needed to shut her up. She had to be here, but she did not have to be happy about it, and she certainly didn’t have to talk about her past with someone she barely knew anymore.  
Pansy stared over her for a while making up her mind if Aurora’s little outburst rubbed her the wrong way. In truth, Pansy had no real strife with Aurora. She liked a friend with a little bit of attitude and backbone.

“Fair enough, I can take that, but you know who’s really going to hate you?” Pansy asked, Aurora raised an eyebrow as she brought her cup to her lips, encouraging her to go on. 

“Draco.”


End file.
